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Expo To Essex

There's no official desert season in the Mojave, but the months from October to May are the most pleasant ones. Daytime temperatures range from balmy to chilly and the nights are crisp. By contrast, June, July, August, and September are mostly toasty and unpleasant.

The Off-Road Expo always brings out the healthy urge to hit the dirt as soon as possible. Naturally, there's only one way to deal with a healthy urge: give in.

Held each year in early October, the Off-Road Expo in Pomona, California, brings together one of the best collections of off-road hardware this side of anywhere. Whether your passion is trail exploring, rockcrawling, desert racing, sand shooting, or prerunning, you'll find something to fuel your off-road needs at the Off-Road Expo.

Giving in to a healthy urge, four trucks and five people assembled in the Off-Road Expo parking lot and made a beeline for the Mojave. Ours was a circuitous path as we wound through the desert, ending up at Interstate 40 and Essex Road before we parted ways and returned to our various responsibilities. Expo to Essex was a perfect way to kick off desert season.

Source
Mojave National Preserve (administered by the National Park Service)
(760) 252-6108www.nps.gov/moja

Guide to 50 Interesting and Mysterious Sites in the Mojave
By Bill Mann
Shortfuse Publishing Co.
30 Hilltop Terrace
Barstow, CA 92311
This book is also available through www.amazon.com and the Center for Land Use Interpretation (www.clui.org)

Southern California's Best Ghost Towns
By Philip Varney
University of Oklahoma Presswww.oupress.com